Your Opportunity For Learning

Rose McGowan is... uh.... ummm...

crap, I forgot what the hell I was going to say

The OFL.

It stands for "Opportunity For Learning". It's really a fine. A fine you pay any time a leader or one of their designated henchmen is offended by your words, deeds, appearance, aura, chakra, energy, or because your trousers are clean and pressed.

To reinforce the "learning" process, the students of the Academy for Psychic Studies were given special projects to accomplish. Over some retreats, Clairvoyant Training Program students were given tasks to perform on a particular schedule. Enforcement was strict. Really strict.

The amounts of the "OFL" was set pretty much arbitrarily. Usually, it ranged from $50 to hundreds of dollars per infraction. Over a retreat weekend, some students racked up over a thousand dollars in "OFL's".

How or what this fine did to help in the student's education is still not known. I have personally seen OFL's levied for infractions such as moving a clock on a table so you can answer a call on the "Psychic Help Line". Apparently, the clock was not to be touched, even if you had to move it to accomplish the cult's work. I've seen others levied because people used the front entrance at a County Fair rather than sneaking in through the back. Once, I saw a fine levied for an OFL because the offender had appeared a few minutes EARLY for a gathering. Her explanation that she was attempting to avoid being late didn't matter. Her instruction was to show up exactly at the appointed time only (which, of course, is an impossible task).

And that is the main failure of the OFL. At the Spiritual Rights Foundation, there is no such thing as a reasonable task. There is such a thing as a stupid, unreasonable, impossible and ludicrous task to be heaved on the shoulders of anyone below the rank of Robin Dumolin, Angela Silva or Bill Duby.

One happened to me. Bill had some kind of catalog for RV supplies. It was a big one full of everything for the sophisticated RV buyer like Bill. Bill handed the thing to me one afternoon asking me to take a look at it. I accepted and told him exactly how long I would have it and where it would be when I was done.

After ten minutes or so of flipping the pages (I wasn't THAT interested in it) I put the catalog exactly where I said I would put it. Ten minutes was a little less than the time I told him but it was close enough.

While no one was looking, someone came along and snatched up the catalog, probably for a little toilet reading. When Bill came to retreive his beloved catalog and found it gone, he mustered the troops to surround ME with accusations of betrayal, instant trances to force me to divulge the whereabouts of the missing catalog. Oh, and impose upon me an OFL. I don't recall the amount but it was one hell of a lot more than that damn catalog was worth.

While all this was going on and while the sludge-encrusted minds of Robin and Angela concocted the amount of the OFL and the duration of my subsequent punishment and derision, someone discovered the catalog was returned to exactly where I left it. Even those fucking half-wits had to admit I had nothing to do with the catalog's disappearance.

So, this arbitrary fine, this concoction of the SRF Kangaroo Kourt called the Opportunity For Learning has not a thing to do with learning. Or opportunty. Or anything at all. Well, nothing at all except to drop a couple of hundred into someone's pocket. And to satisfy someone's need to control. Oh, and the preverse, psychotic and sadistic desire to watch a person with few resources, someone who is dedicating much of his wealth and income to an organization that worships only money get socked for even more of his hard earned cash. Even cash he may need to survive.

Because, wouldn't you rather be in love than be right? Wouldn't you rather be giver? Isn't money no good unless you spend it? And aren't you worth an investment in yourself? So invest in that Opportunity For Learning.  Just remember you won't get your principal investment back.  Or interest.  Of anything more than a kick in the ass.

At some organizations, fines are levied in fun. I once fined a guy a pound of Kona coffee and a box of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts because he was answering his work email on his vacation in Hawaii. We shared the Kona coffee and macadamia nuts when he got back and yes, they were amazing. Sometimes, they are levied for a specific purpose. James Brown vowed to slap his musicians with a $100 fine if they came on stage with unpolished shoes. I'd say that's reasonable to expect, considering he's the Godfather of Soul.

There was no real, specific purpose for an SRF fine. It just depended on how crappy a mood the giver of the fine happened to be in and whatever that person can think of to tell someone who believes they are doing the right thing they are doing something completely wrong.

Yes, it's arbitrary. Yes it is punitive. And yes, it made no damn sense at all.

But the leaders imposed it, and people paid it.

You had to.

The leadership was meticulous about accounting for every nickel levied against you as an OFL fine. In fact, some of the figures I heard of seemed impossible, as if there were double-booking of the fines or inflation of the amount imposed on the hapless victim.

And that detailed, slightly accurate record would follow you around until it was paid. In full. If you did not pay in full, you would be denied the ministerial title you worked so hard to achieve.

Well actually, you put up with a hell of a lot of crap to get it.

OK, so it's more like you stuck a "kick me" sign on the seat of you pants while the leaders rummaged through your pockets to get it.

I'm sure someone, somewhere is just burning up with frustration wanting to ask me how I can say the Spiritual Rights Foundation can pick your pocket while slapping you in the face.

The answer is three letters:

OFL

Anonymous said...

Most of the time, the students were given a very difficult assignment that took them to camping spots, casinos and of course county or city fairs. Usually, it was a set up, as Bill would make it difficult for the unsuspecting students to complete the task. We were suppose to use our intuition in fulfilling not only the spirit of the law but of the letter.

So, he would create the rules and regulations of assignment, knowing it was going to fail because he pigeon holed the students to fail! So after a while, one of the founding members offered OFL insurance for a flat fee. Sometimes the flat fee would be 2 or 3 hundred dollars per year class student on assignment. That way, they would have no fear of screwing up and getting fined, and just enjoy the assignment and the journey through it.

Sometimes they would roll the dice and have to pay over $500 for one weekend alone! In the later years, when they realized those with less deep pockets than the early stalwarts were given a free pass. Though in return, they would lean more on the staff and especially the older ones who had their pockets picked for years in the name of "spiritual freedom".

One of the leaders was famous for emotionally black mailing ministers and students if having to collect donations for a false cause (hay for the farm which is owned by Robin DuMolin and Angela Silva not the church), a lavish birthday gift for Rev. Bill, Angela or Robin, by saying..."Don't you want to give to your church"? Implying that we didn't or that we wanted to spend it friviously on I don't know...US!

If you didn't comply, someone would smile in your face, and then report back those who were stuck in their personality and wouldn't give. In fact, our monthly staff meetings and pre church service minister class, there would be between 5 and 8 envelopes passed around with an occasional abusive verbal beat down if they didn't receive what was expected of them.

Then turn around and tell us how expectations were a bad thing and always with strings attached.

Angela Silva probably was laughing at us all for falling for her bullshit causes. As Rev. Bill would say, she is back at home marinating her fat! Lord knows she never did any work except for spew bullshit out of her mouth at meetings.

September 4, 2009 3:05 PM